IBM is continuously looking for ways to enhance our products and solutions to meet our customer's need to keep pace with the rate of business change and expand their data storage needs. Towards that end, IBM is making a series of important announcements. Following is a brief summary of those announcements. To learn more, listen to the 15 minute webcast entitled, "Accelerate the Journey to Smarter Computing."

News about IBM Storage Systems.IBM delivers storage systems that analyze, adapt to, and improve application performance. Following are some of the enhancements.

XIV Gen3 now supports three terabyte drives and can support active workloads for less than half the cost of competitive storage systems.

The Storwize V7000 Unified, an advanced mid-ranger storage server offers file and block storage on the same system with a world-class user interface.

News about Cloud Infrastructure Solutions• IBM is launching new, easy to deploy starter kits that allow clients to respond to changing business demands and quickly move to cloud models. The Starter Kits for Cloud for x86 and Power dramatically increase IT efficiency for customers through standardization and lower operating costs.

• The zEnterprise Starter Edition for Cloud offers customers an entry-level infrastructure as a service delivery model for Linux on System z with Tivoli Provisioning Manager.

• IBM Systems Software delivers new cloud-ready capabilities that improve system utilization up to 50% and reduce time to deploy new workloads by 90% with advanced virtualization management. Systems Director VMControl V2.4 offers virtual image management capabilities for System z, System x and Power Systems users.

• IBM is also enhancing support and offerings for Business Partners, helping them to build clouds for their clients. Check out IBM Partnerworld for all the details.

News about business analytics and reporting services featuring affordable entry-level solutions.• With the introduction of new, all-in-one cost-effective analytics systems across our server platforms, IBM is providing companies with business analytics and reporting services to help them make faster and better business decisions.

• The IBM Smart Analytics System 5710 for System x users provides warehousing and analytics capabilities at an attractive entry point.

• The IBM Smart Analytics System 7710, built on POWER7 technology and IBM data warehouse management software and storage, is an affordable, integrated solution that can deliver analytics projects at half the price of the 7700.

• The DB2 Analytics Accelerator is an appliance Netezza-based system that plugs into DB2 for z/OS on a z196 server to speed response time for a wide variety of complex queries.

News about IBM Power Systems: new optimized systems that are tuned to the task for businesses of all sizes.• A number of enhancements to IBM's Systems Director family are designed to optimize workloads for systems by increasing IT staff productivity by up to 20%, reducing IT administration costs by up to 42% and reducing energy costs by up to 20%. For example, new capabilities in Systems Director V6.3 simplify usability and database management functions and improve performance and scalability.

• Enhancements to the Power Express server lineup, along with the Power 770, feature the latest industry I/O standards and deliver twice the throughput in the same physical and energy footprint. The Power 780 now offers up to 96 POWER7 processor cores, plus doubled memory, ideal for high throughput and big data analytics projects.

• Two new, entry-level System x servers -- the System x3100 M4 and System x3250 M4 -- feature low prices for clients who value server-class dependability, serviceability and security. The System x3755 M3, based on AMD Opteron technology, is designed for High Performance Computing and mid-size workloads such as database, business intelligence and ERP.

• IBM is expanding the application portfolio of zEnterprise, fulfilling a statement of direction to support Microsoft Windows on HX5 blades as part of the zEnterprise BladeCenter Extension (zBX) offering.

• Use storage efficiency as a foundation for unlocking insights and making better decisions